


From the ashes we can build another day

by minkhollow



Series: your memory seems like a living thing [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Blind Character, Crowley Was Raphael Before Falling (Good Omens), Magical Tattoos, Metaphysical Intimacy, Other, Post-Apocanope, Wing Grooming, accidental bodyswap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-08
Updated: 2020-06-13
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:33:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24600880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minkhollow/pseuds/minkhollow
Summary: As the months stretch on after the Apocanope, Hell gets on with business as usual, Heaven tries to pretend nothing went wrong in the first place, and those who have chosen Earth start working out what that choice means.
Series: your memory seems like a living thing [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1773067
Comments: 10
Kudos: 53





	1. now I'm hearing your voice saying anything is possible

**Author's Note:**

> HOKAY SO. This is a part-overlap, part-sequel to [(I saved you) the gift of empathy](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23743813); go read that first or you'll find yourself horribly confused, and no one has time for that. This particular story is complete, but I'm not necessarily done with this continuity yet.
> 
> Many thanks to ZabbyPerno for helping me work out the details of chapter 2.

It’s draining, being so angry all the time, but Tarkus doesn’t have much choice in the matter. Not if she wants to keep her head on her shoulders, anyway.

She’s adapted to the loss of her sight since coming round in the pit, but the others are still more likely than not to conflate blindness and weakness. What it _is_ is fucking inconvenient, but she refuses to let it keep her down - and if someone underestimates her for it, that’s their loss. Still, if she’s not ready to fight for the scraps she’s got, she won’t keep them.

And anyway, anger’s easier than actually letting herself break down and grieve. It’s a bad coping mechanism and she blessed well knows it, but what else is she meant to do? Adapting to blindness doesn’t mean she’s made peace with it. Her old mentor slunk off like he was hoping everyone would ignore his previous high station (and to his credit, it seems to have worked), and spends all his time planetside. One of her old friends is stuck in a dozen fucking pieces because of the war.

The other hasn’t said a word to her since they were separated, and Tarkus misses Neriel fiercely, but she can’t very well admit that to anyone other than Eric. Neither of them are sure whether the remaining angels forgot all about them, or are just too convinced they were in the right to bother reaching out.

(As time passes and a few angels spout self-righteous bullshit before smiting whatever demons they come across, Tarkus starts hoping Neriel forgot. It hurts enough that they can’t see each other anymore; the thought of her friend turning on her like that just makes her angrier.)

She doesn’t get a planetside assignment until a few decades after Eric starts leaving a corporation planetside as often as they can (Crowley hogging the prime assignments doesn’t help matters), but when she does, it’s weirdly relaxing. Somehow, despite the fucking bone plates on her shoulders and claws on her hands, she stands out less among humans than she does among demons. Humans aren’t great at dealing with blind people either, but there are more of them, which means some basic accommodations exist.

 _And_ she can track the passage of time by herself, based on what ambient light she can still see. It’s her first real experience with days - Time came after the Rebellion, and Hell’s so dark that she gave up trying to keep track and just asked Eric every now and then if it was a new century yet. She thinks she likes it.

By that point, they’re barrelling toward the grudge match and she doesn’t see much use in getting any more invested in Earth; the occasional planetside assignments come up, sure, but they’re just jobs in a place that’ll be gone sooner than later.

But then the grudge match suddenly isn’t. Fine by her, really. She’s no less of an expert on the celestial mind just because half those minds are now infernal. They’re doing such a fucking wonderful job of coping with the first war that piling a second on top of it would’ve only made matters worse, not that anyone will admit it.

She doesn’t particularly want to go to Crowley’s trial, but it’s the sort of thing where it’s clear there’s no acceptable reason _not_ to go. Hell wants as many witnesses to what happens to traitors as possible - which backfires in short fucking order, when it turns out he’s found a way around execution by holy water, of all things.

(It’s weird; Crowley sounds like himself, but also doesn’t, exactly. Tarkus can’t put her finger on it, and it’s been long enough since they really talked that she’s not even sure if she’s right.)

A while after that complete disaster of a weekend, Eric contacts her. Something pretty much everyone else overlooks about scattered, disposable Eric is that they can almost always spare the concentration for a direct mental line, since one of their corporations is usually not doing anything important. It’s not much, just _we need to talk_ and a few good places to find them planetside, but that’s enough to leave Tarkus wondering what’s up.

She catches up to them in Cincinnati, in the middle of a teeming crowd of humans by the river. Picking one demon out of the throng and navigating it isn’t even that much of a challenge - Hell’s just as bad about the concept of personal space, and she has scent and sound to fall back on - but she still says, “Really?” when she finds Eric.

“There’s a big fireworks show tonight. It’s always worth seeing, Tark.”

Tarkus gives that statement the icy silence it fucking well deserves.

“Well - I - so to speak, and anyway I _did_ say you could find me in Berlin or Hong Kong.”

“I got here first. You’re the one who didn’t think it through.”

Eric sighs. “Yeah, sorry. I just… something happened you should know about. You know how there was that whole trial thing?”

“Hard to miss, since no one will fucking shut up about it.” Tarkus can’t really blame them, and has mostly been wondering how the authorities expected forbidding discussion of the botched execution to make it stop, but it’s getting a little old. At least no one’s thought of how well she used to know Crowley and cornered her for thoughts on how he did it, which she hasn’t got.

“Well, Upstairs apparently had the same idea for theirs. I got sent up to give ‘em some Hellfire for it.”

“And how’d that go, as well as ours did?”

“I didn’t exactly stick around to watch. I - they _promoted the toad_ , Tark. Less time I had to share space with him, the better.” She can hear the full-body shudder in Eric’s voice - no surprise, considering. “Anyway, that’s not the thing. The thing was on my way out. I saw Neri.”

“And?”

“And she knew it was me.”

“Well, fucking good for her. She could have said something before now, if she wanted to, and now we know she doesn’t. What makes you think you’ll suddenly be worth her time now?”

Eric splutters for a few moments before coming back around to proper words. “It’s _Neri_ , Tark. She’s never been like that and you know it. Besides, she didn’t discorporate me, just stared until I ran for it.”

“She _wasn’t_ like that. How do you know they haven’t made her be like that now? We already fucking lost her once, and that’s more than enough for me. Enjoy your stupid fireworks.”

Tarkus turns and leaves before Eric can stop her, taking advantage of the crowd to go - bless it, she doesn’t care, anywhere planetside that isn’t here. Not caring lands her somewhere tropical, by the feel of the weather, but there’s no point in her staying somewhere she can’t even enjoy the point of.

She’d rather never see Neriel again than know Heaven killed everything that made her worth knowing.

***

When Eric tells her Neriel wants to talk, Tarkus considers it, if only to tell her to go fuck herself, but ultimately her answer is the same. She wants no part of pretending everything’s fine when it hasn’t been fine in six millennia and counting. If Eric wants to delude themself into thinking something can be salvaged, that’s their business.

That’s her plan and she sticks to it, right up until she catches wind of a flare of divine power in London, uncomfortably near one of Eric’s corporations. If that wasn’t intended to cause trouble for Eric, it’s almost certainly going to _attract_ trouble, and she’s not going to let a bunch of angels gang up on the one person she halfway cares about anymore. Besides, if anyone else in Hell even notices, they’ll probably assume it’ll be fine, because it’s just boring, disposable Eric.

Eric is not fucking disposable.

Neriel, blessed fool that she is, didn’t even ward her work space before she started doing - whatever it was she was doing. Tarkus doesn’t rightly care about anything other than getting her to leave Eric _alone_ , but then Neriel disarms her with the first genuine apology she’s heard in… Tarkus doesn’t know how long, really. Certainly before the Rebellion, but she’s not sure by how much.

Her anger crumbles, bit by bit, in the face of Neriel explaining she wants to fix Eric’s corporation problem, because Eric asked her to and it’s the right thing to do. It mostly shatters when Neriel says Tarkus can walk away afterward, for all it sounds like she doesn’t _want_ to say it. Eric was right - somehow, the Archangels didn’t ruin her, failed to force her into a mold that would have suited Heaven’s ideals.

Fuck it, she’s going to kill herself trying to do this if Tarkus doesn’t help. So she does, and they even mostly succeed, which is more than she can say for any other attempts to get Eric in fewer than twelve pieces - but as predicted, it takes so much out of Neriel that she collapses as soon as they return to the physical world.

Almost immediately, there’s a foreign flare of divine power, big enough that Tarkus can’t pinpoint it. “Shit. We need to get moving before whoever that is gets here.” She hauls herself off the ground. “Hand her to me and let’s go. You feeling well enough to kick their asses if they catch us?”

“Depends on who’s following up,” Eric says, arranging Neriel’s corporation in Tarkus’ arms as they talk; she’s heavier than Tarkus expected for a corporation, since those strike a weird balance between avian and mammal, but that’s probably because she’s inert. “But I’ll give it my best shot.”

If there’s good news, it’s that whoever’s closing in can’t eclipse the beacon of Neriel’s would-be safe house in Soho, probably because it’s been there for so fucking long that nothing’s going to out-shout it. Once they reach the boundary of the park, Eric miracles them all to the proper corner (it’ll leave a more obvious trail, but it’s faster than going on foot).

“You should probably knock. Considering the last time I saw the owner, he might… not be all that thrilled to see me.”

“Fair enough.” Tarkus shifts Neriel’s weight to free up a hand, steps up to the door with a confidence granted by letting the ambient echoes tell her where the steps are - and swears the second her hand makes contact. But a fucking ward isn’t going to stop her right now, so she knocks again, and keeps it up until the door pulls away from her hand.

“We’re currently-- ah.” Whoever opened the door pauses for a few moments, presumably taking in the motley assortment on his doorstep. “Well, the three of you had best come in, in that case. Do you know how close your pursuer is?”

“I sort of cheated when we left the park,” Eric says, “so probably not far.”

“Very well. I’ll see to them, when they show up, and you two can worry about your friend.”

Tarkus makes it all of three steps into the building (far enough to close the door again) before she can’t move any further. This place is full of _stuff_ , causing echoes upon echoes that the others probably can’t even hear - but she’s been relying on her ears to make up for non-functional eyes for so long that she’s catching every single one. There’s no way she can make it through this blessed maze on her own. Possibly literally blessed, considering an angel owns the place.

A familiarish demonic aura slinks out of the depths of the building, and Tarkus can’t even say she’s surprised. Neriel told them to find one of the so-called traitors, and where one is, the other apparently isn’t far behind.

“What’s going on, angel?” Crowley says, but before anyone can answer, he carries on, in a tone Tarkus hasn’t heard since sometime out in the stars. “Oh, Lantern, what did you go and _do_?”

The portion of Tarkus’ anger that she’s been holding specifically for Neriel finally gives out for good, in that moment. Names have power, and nicknames have always been Crowley’s weapon of choice, whether to distance himself from someone he can’t afford to get attached to, mock the deserving and pretend they have no hold on him, or mark the people he’s got attached to despite himself as coming under his protection. She’d bet anything that ‘angel’ started as distance and changed to affection, just like ‘Lucy’ started as affection and became ‘no one else is bold enough to mock Satan himself.’

If Neriel’s still deserving of Crowley’s affection, then she really _hasn’t_ changed, not in the ways that count.

“She fixed me,” Eric says. “Well. Mostly fixed me.”

“Yeah, I see that. She better still be in there, or we’re gonna have bigger problems.”

Tarkus sighs. “Look, we can debate that somewhere whatever angel’s chasing us _won’t see us right away_ , but one of you’s going to have to take Neriel and the other…” Fuck, she hates having to admit she needs help, but she always has, even Before. “The other needs to help me get to wherever you’re going to put her. I can’t navigate this fucking disaster by myself.”

“Here, Tark, I got her.” Eric takes Neriel’s corporation from her, leaving Crowley to take Tarkus by the arm and guide her through the labyrinth. It’s probably for the best, since he’ll know the safest place for Neriel to recover.

When he finally stops, he says, “You’re right in front of a chair, and Aziraphale will have to live with you borrowing it. Lantern’s on a sofa across the way from you. You’ll be out of sight of the door, but don’t go drawing attention to yourself. They all expect me to be here, at this point, so my presence will mask yours for the most part.”

“Got it.” Eric hesitates. “Will Neri…”

“She’s just worn herself out. My guess is if someone’s chasing you, she hasn’t actually discorporated. If she doesn’t wake up by morning we may have a problem, but she should be fine.”

With that, Crowley leaves, Eric flops to the floor if the heavy thud’s anything to go by, and Tarkus sits down in the chair behind her, keeping an ear on the door. She hardly needs to be trying; they’ve been settled for five minutes at most when the wards on the building _ripple_ in a way they didn’t when they shocked her.

“Michael,” Aziraphale’s voice says, and Tarkus blanches - they sent fucking _Wank-Wings_ after Neriel? “I believe I made it quite clear that I was not to be interfered with any longer.”

Frustratingly, she can’t hear what Wank-Wings has to say for herself. The distance shouldn’t be that much of a strain, not for Tarkus, so it’s probably a combination of the clutter in here and the ward structure keeping unwanted poison out. That Aziraphale’s had the sense to see Heaven as capable of poison is a promising sign.

“I will be doing no such thing,” Aziraphale says. After a pause, he adds, “No, I don’t happen to care what you believe transpired in the park.” Another pause. “Nor what’s taken place over Neriel’s private communications. We are, after all, meant to be doing good for humanity, are we not? How can one do that if one is not properly informed?”

After yet another pause, Aziraphale carries on in an icy tone that rattles Eric hard enough their aura shivers. “I will _not_ be remanding her to your custody, Michael, and you are _not welcome in my shop_. I have nothing more to say on the topic, unless you believe a chat over a spot of Hellfire would clear things up further?” One more pause; now Aziraphale sounds tremendously satisfied. “I thought not. Good day, Michael.”

The door slams shut.

“Well, that was fun. I don’t believe they’ll be troubling us again.”

“You magnificent _bastard_ ,” Crowley says, voice dripping with affection, and the pair wander off to another part of the building.

Eric sighs. “ _God_.”

Tarkus doesn’t think she’s heard them invoke the Almighty since Before, but she really can’t blame them. “No shit. We could’ve fought her off or kept Neriel safe, and I’m not sure we would’ve managed either.”

“I can’t fight _her_ alone. Not even in a dozen pieces - I mean, I should see if I still can split further after that repair job, it’d still be useful. But it’s like they want her to Fall, or to actually break her, this time.”

“Well, they’re not fucking doing either. Not if I have anything to say about it.”

“Me either, Tark.”

They lapse into silence after that, comfortable if edged with worry about Neriel’s condition, sitting vigil by her side for hours. After quite some time, Earth music starts up, some cheery piano tune Tarkus doesn’t recognise.

“Huh,” Eric says. “I know we passed a record player on the way back here, but I don’t think anyone’s come down. Was that you?”

“No. How’s Neriel?”

“She hasn’t moved, but if it wasn’t you and it wasn’t me, maybe she’s waking up.”

Tarkus shrugs, not really caring one way or the other about the mystery until the cheery piano tune decides it ought to punch her in the gut.

 _Doctor, my eyes,_ it says, _they cannot see the sky,_ and that on top of everyfuckingthing else today is enough to make an ancient emotional dam crumble. She sobs, finally letting herself grieve for all that she’s lost and attempt to cope with the impossibility of getting some of it back anyway, and Eric squeezes her hand and lets her cry it out.

***

They can’t pick up where they left off. But while Neriel’s fool enough to attempt a major healing procedure without so much as warding her workspace, she’s not fool enough to pretend they _could_ do that; instead, she suggests starting over. That’s more doable, all things considered.

Neriel is also not fool enough to postpone warding her base of operations, once she has one. Tarkus thinks it’s risky of her to build any exceptions into the wards at all, but she sure isn’t complaining about being one of those exceptions - and it’s apparently rooted in feathers, which are harder to fool than just about any other ward configuration she’s heard of. It’ll do, but they still need to work on the matter of keeping her safe when she wants to leave the house on her own.

Eric’s already been taking more planetside assignments, thanks to the gap left by Crowley’s dramatic resignation, and Tarkus starts picking up more as well. It seems worth getting to know Earth, now that the grudge match has been called off - it’s going to take at _least_ a few millennia for anyone to get their heads screwed on enough to try again - and anyway, she can’t exactly talk to Neriel if she spends all her time in Hell.

Two months in, she meets up with Eric in Perth to compare notes. The brisk air is a sharp contrast to the hot drink Eric hands her when they join her.

“What’s up?”

“I noticed a really fucking weird pattern. You ever roll up to a planetside assignment only to find out the humans--”

“Have already done all the hard work themselves?” Eric finishes. “ _All the time_. Explains an awful lot in hindsight, doesn’t it?”

“No shit. But they can’t really complain about us cheating and claiming it anyway, not without being fucking hypocrites.” It doesn’t mean Hell wouldn’t be fucking hypocrites about it, of course, but Tarkus feels better for not being the only one picking up on this pattern.

“That’s not the only weird bit. You run into any angels while you’re out and about? Other than… the obvious places.”

Tarkus has to think about that for a while, and finds herself frowning more and more as she does so. “Shit. No. I can’t say that I have. You think they’re too scared to send out another field agent?”

“From what Neri said, they barely wanted to have a field agent in the first place, and, well. Look what happened to the last two angels to spend any real time here. I’d be worried I eventually wouldn’t have anyone left, if I were them.”

“Gonna bite ‘em in the ass sooner or later.”

“I mean, probably,” Eric says, in a tone that Tarkus has come to think of as a verbal shrug. “If they ever stop to wonder who’s responsible for the _good_ shit humans are doing just fine on their own. I can’t say I’m in any hurry to pass the news Downstairs, though. Are you?”

“ _Fuck_ no. You know how they’d get. Besides, I’m with Neriel and Crowley on this one. It’ll be funnier to watch them make a complete fucking mess out of this by themselves. If Upstairs wants to try a travel ban, someone’s gonna work out a way around it.”

“You’re assuming they’ll want to try. Everyone who’s left up there didn’t ask questions last time, so why would they start now?”

“Wrong,” Tarkus says. “Everyone who’s left up there didn’t _demand answers from Herself_ last time. You don’t really think anyone _Crowley_ was mentoring got out of the experience unable to form questions, do you? There’s a reason Neriel was the best healer they had left after everything - she never needed to know the reasons as badly as the rest of us.”

“Wait, Crowley was Neri’s - but that would make him… well, bless it. Done a thorough job keeping that quiet, hasn’t he?” Eric’s quiet for several moments; thankfully, they don’t ask questions Tarkus can’t answer, and doesn’t think it’d be wise to answer if she could, at this point. “You really think it’s that big a distinction?”

“She hasn’t Fallen for leaving. Neither has Aziraphale, and what was calling off the grudge match if not asking a lot of inconvenient questions?”

“Got a point there. You know, if the state of things when I made that delivery was any sign, they didn’t want anyone to know they were gonna kill him. What’s the point of setting an example if you don’t actually show that example to anyone?”

“Not fucking much.” Tarkus sighs. “I bet they wanted to pretend he never happened. And if they don’t bother with a new field agent, they’re probably trying to pretend Earth isn’t a concern anymore, at least long enough to figure out what to do next.”

The funny thing is, the longer she’s up here, the more she wants to help make sure that bites Heaven in the ass… but not to Hell’s advantage.

***

Just before the one-year anniversary of the canceled grudge match, Neriel calls Tarkus - she ditched her Heaven-issued phone right after the healing clusterfuck, but they still haven’t cut her funds, so it’s not like she has to worry about roaming charges.

“I have everything set up now,” she says. “Come back for your second tour whenever you like.”

“I’ll see when I can squeeze you in.” But even as she says that, Tarkus is planning to get to London by the end of the day.

London’s a fucking relief after the constant, baking humidity of her latest assignment in New Orleans (once again, she barely had to lift a finger). There’s still enough dampness on the air for Tarkus to know the city’s on a river, but it’s not nearly as oppressive.

She can find Aziraphale’s base of operations without even trying, by now; the problem is that it’s so blessed loud it drowns out Neriel’s presence until she’s on the same block. There’s no mistaking she’s in the right neighborhood, but she’s not going into the biting bookshop again if she can help it, between the wards and the complete anarchy inside. When she gets to Neriel’s base, she lets herself in and waits for Neriel to notice.

It doesn’t take long at all. “That was fast. Come in properly, I promise it’s not as crowded as Aziraphale’s.”

“That didn’t stop me hanging onto you for the first tour, did it?”

“Well, if you really want an excuse to be that close, I’m not complaining.” Before Tarkus can really process that, Neriel’s looped an arm through hers and is gently guiding her away from the door. “I asked Eric if they’d like to come by as well, but they’re too spread out to manage it tonight, so it’ll just be us.”

One room downstairs has been laid out in a manner Tarkus knows, from where it echoes and where it doesn’t, as the kind of liminal space humans associate with waiting for someone to come talk to them, and from that alone she knows Neriel’s purpose. “How much of this do you plan on doing without miracles, anyway? Humans don’t need the same kind of healing work we do.”

“Maybe not, but if I can make their lives a little easier, I want to. I’ve been reading up on what to do without leaning on miracles, so I’ll be fine. You know how it is, even if it’s not what you do these days.”

“If you say so. How much do you plan on charging for all this?”

She can practically hear Neriel’s blank stare. “Charge?”

“Fuck’s sake, they’re _never_ going to believe there’s no catch.”

“They don’t need to. It’s not as though I need the money anyway.”

Tarkus sighs, but lets the point go (she’s right about the money, if nothing else) in favor of continuing the tour. Neriel walks her through the space where she intends to talk to humans, if only so Tarkus doesn’t make a complete fucking fool of herself if she has to go through there for some unknown reason. It smells overwhelmingly sterile, but there’s enough variation in sounds for her to be able to navigate it.

Halfway up the stairs to the private part of the building (“don’t worry, there’s still eleven of them”), the smell dissipates entirely. “Oh, thank fuck. If I had to smell cleaner the entire time I was here, we’d _also_ be having words.”

“I didn’t want to smell it all the way up here, either. Come on, I saved the best part for last.”

The largest room in the upstairs space is a lot quieter than it was last time Tarkus was here, and not just because Neriel’s not playing any music at the moment. Something’s muted the echoes in the room substantially, other than a path to the right and what seems to be a loaded table next to the doorway. Tarkus frowns, takes a couple steps forward, and reaches down in front of her until her hand hits cloth. That at least explains how it got so quiet, but she keeps exploring until she thinks she’s grasped the rough shape.

“Wait, is this one of those human bed things?”

“The biggest mattress I could find,” Neriel confirms.

“Thought they didn’t keep them on the floor - hang on, did you turn this room into a fucking _nest_?”

“Of course I did. It’s the biggest one up here, so it’s the only one that was going to have enough room. I’m still not sure what to do with the room at the back, or what I’d need the kitchen or bathroom for, so I’ve left those alone for now. But I’m hardly going to rest in a room where I can’t get my wings out without bending the physical space available to me.”

“Nearly a year and you haven’t had a bath yet? You’re fucking slacking.” Tarkus finds herself vaguely wondering if Neriel’s bothered to actually _sleep_ in her time on Earth, or just passed out from over-exertion. “So what’s on the table?”

“Four ways to play music, if you include hooking the computer up to it. There’s a cabinet underneath to store the things I’ve bought, and… well, I probably _will_ have to bend that physical space before long. I’m still working on a system for it.”

“As long as it’s not leaving shit all over the floor. I want some food. You want some food?”

“It has been a few weeks,” Neriel says. “Why not? Let me go get my takeaway menus.”

***

For someone who first tried food six months ago, Neriel’s amassed more menus than Tarkus would have expected, including Eric’s favorite curry place and a pizza shop. In the end, they settle on fish and chips, eating it sprawled out across the giant nest with Neriel showing off highlights from her music collection so far.

Relaxing doesn’t come easily to most demons, even ones who aren’t as preternaturally paranoid as Eric can be. Hell isn’t exactly the kind of place that inspires letting one’s guard down, and most demons don’t bother going planetside, other than the handful who are taking assignments now. In Tarkus’ particular case, letting her guard down would have left her with even less warning of oncoming trouble than someone who can see would have had. Even now, part of her mind is screaming that The Enemy is Right There and that’s a Big Problem.

Which is fucking stupid, now that she knows Neriel escaped Heaven with her personality intact. Neriel was always the least combat-oriented of their group by far, and if that had changed, she had the perfect opportunity to be rid of two demons in February - and instead, she explicitly invited them both into her home. If there’s anywhere in existence that Tarkus _can_ actually relax, it’s here.

She doesn’t realise she’s managed it until they’re long since done eating; several minutes into a rambling, extremely weird piece of Earth music that apparently ended up with her _name_ on it somehow, Neriel gasps.

“Oh, Tarkus. When’s the last time someone else helped you with your wings?”

Tarkus almost pulls her wings back in reflexively (when did they even get out?), but stops herself. “I think you were there for it. Eric usually hasn’t had the time or the concentration, and it’s not like I can see theirs to return the favor.”

Or like demons are known for doing each other favors unprompted. Eric probably would, if she asked them, but then she’d have to ask for help, and that’s not fucking likely.

“Come down here and let me do it.”

“Look, I know they’re a fucking wreck, but you don’t have to--”

“I want to.” Neriel’s voice is firm in a way she rarely uses, which only makes it more obvious she means business. “You won’t let me do anything about your eyes, so let me do this. I won’t keep anything you don’t want me to.”

Tarkus sighs, and some shuffling about the giant nest later, she’s on the floor, leaning against an exposed side of the mattress, with Neriel sitting behind her and treating her to the kind of pampering she hasn’t had since she could still see the results.

“I’m a little surprised you didn’t change them.”

“Eric says a lot of us… didn’t.” Stringing words together is already getting difficult, but Tarkus isn’t going to give in that easily. “The ones who did were mostly ones who ended up with different wings as options. Beelzebub leans hard into the fly thing, there’s other bugs, think we have a few bats kicking around the place. It makes sense, though.”

“It does?”

“Well, yeah. They could take our fucking names, but they can’t say we never were who we were. Another ‘fuck you’ to the Upstairs establishment. And I don’t care if I can’t see mine anymore, I still like the blue.”

Neriel hums, and carries on in relative silence for a while. Eventually, when she’s shifted out to the left wing’s primaries and Tarkus is trying to tell her ‘humans find it weird if you don’t have one’ Effort to stop taking a blessed interest, she says, “Why don’t you want me to heal your eyes, anyway?”

“ _Neriel_...”

“I’m not going to try to convince you. You’ve clearly made some kind of peace with it, and that’s your right. I just want to know why.”

“Nosy bugger.” Still, Neriel keeps her word on this sort of thing, which makes Tarkus mind the prospect of talking about it a lot less. “It’s like your one stupid song says. I tried to know everything, and look where it got me. Maybe it’ll keep me from getting that cocky again. Besides--” She has to bite back a whimper as Neriel finishes her left wing and moves to her right. “Besides, I’m not sure it’d work.”

At least Tarkus can rest assured she’s not the only one losing composure, if the ambient glow reaching what’s left of her sight from behind her is any indication. “Why not? I know it’s not the same sort of thing as Eric’s sundering damage, but…”

“I think it’s an animal aspect thing. They rub off, whether we like it or not. Crowley gets hissy if he’s not paying attention, Eric’s skittish and perpetually thirsty, I get bony plates and claws and can’t fucking see. Anyway, the look of eyes is always the hardest thing to alter, windows to the soul and all, so there’s not even any point in the cosmetic change without fucking with how they work. I don’t think it’d work and there’s no point in you feeling bad about not being able to do it.”

Neriel laughs. “If Eric hadn’t explained when they dropped by in May, I’d be asking why you don’t just get them a glass of water.”

“They were here and you didn’t tell me?”

“They didn’t… exactly plan to be here. Otherwise I’m sure they would have let you know.”

Tarkus snorts. Unplanned teleportation is a new one, but she can’t bring herself to be angry at either of them. After being angry at everything for so long, it’s a weird experience, and one she intends to savor. “Guess we’ve got nothing but time, really.”

“Exactly.” Neriel goes back to her work, and Tarkus all but melts into the attention. She might as well have forgotten how _good_ a thorough preening can feel, considering she can’t fucking well manage it on her own.

When Neriel declares the job done, Tarkus makes an incoherent noise and gives up on physicality. She needs to fucking stretch out after that or - well, something’s going to explode, anyway, and Neriel would probably be upset if it was anything in her base that fell victim. Besides, the metaphysical plane at least lets her pretend she can see, and every now and then she needs that.

In the early days after the Rebellion, it felt like the pit tried to climb out of the pit with her, but by now Tarkus has made that bubbling lava her own. It smells more like the stuff humans use to pave their roads than proper sulfur, which is an improvement all on its own, and it only burns what she wants to burn.

The electric itch of Neriel’s presence isn’t far behind her; it’s borderline agonizing, like she should by all rights do everything she can to get away, but an intense relief at the same time. Tarkus has, lately, heard humans complaining about getting hot water on an itchy skin irritation, and she thinks she knows the feeling.

_Are you all right?_

_Yeah, that was just… a lot, after so long._ This is kind of a lot too, but it’s a more familiar intensity, so she can deal with it better.

_I understand. Do you want to stay here for a while?_

_I think I do._

She should be recoiling from that itch. Instead, Tarkus chases it - and Neriel reaches back, chasing fire that she trusts won’t be turned against her. She couldn’t say exactly how long they linger, only that the way light is coming into the room has changed when they return, and so has the temperature of the light breeze coming in through the open windows. The music has stopped playing, probably because Neriel wasn’t there to prod it along; otherwise, it seems weirdly quiet, for a summer morning in the heart of a busy city.

She opens her eyes, and immediately closes them again. _Shit_ , that was too bright, that was too much, that was--

Slowly, Tarkus turns her head away from the windows and tries that again. She has no Earthly idea what all the boxes that make up Neriel’s music system are supposed to do, but being so much darker in color, they’re easier to stare at while she tries to figure out _why the fuck she can stare at them at all_.


	2. to fly to the sun without burning a wing

She’s startled out of shellshocked contemplation of Neriel’s music system by something brushing against her foot. Tarkus jumps at the sudden contact, and nearly kicks Neriel in the head. ...In _her own_ head, which just makes her wonder what the fuck they did all over again.

Whatever it was, Neriel’s wings didn’t get the memo, and went with her; it was probably a feather that startled her. They’re spread out, sagging a bit under their own weight as Neriel dozes, still pitch-black like they were for working in the stars… except for the patches of red and yellow right where they emerge from her back, new since the last time Tarkus saw them. Fucking sentimental idiot.

(Tarkus is finding she understands Crowley’s deep well of affection for Aziraphale more and more, these days. Or maybe it’s just that she’s letting herself feel it again.)

She frowns. Humans have reflective surfaces, don’t they? Surely she can summon one into the room; a thought later, she does, a long, thin thing with a fat silver frame leaning against a spare patch of wall. It’s ugly as anything - if Neriel wants to keep it, Tarkus is going to have some concerns - but it gets the job done.

Neriel’s corporation is petite, which almost makes her inert weight even more impressive. At some point she pulled her dark brown hair back into a loose braid; the end has a slight wave to it. Tarkus shifts in place, and grimaces as she does so and fabric moves against her - internal Efforts are _weird_. She prefers the advance warning external Efforts give that they’re up to something. Still, it’s not her corporation to alter, so she leaves it be.

Neriel’s eyes haven’t changed a bit, still a bright jewel-tone green that stood out in Heaven and probably stands out on Earth.

“What the fuck,” she says, and tries to stifle a hysterical laugh at the utter absurdity of Neriel’s voice swearing for a change.

Naturally, that little noise is enough to stir Neriel into proper wakefulness (but on a normal day, it would’ve done the same to Tarkus, no matter how hard anyone she’s willing to rest around tried to keep quiet). “Tarkus?” she says, still groggy, before sitting bolt upright. “Tarkus? Where are you? I can’t - I can’t--”

Tarkus leans forward to rest her hands on Neriel’s (her own) shoulders. “Breathe, Neri, I’m right here. Breathe. It’s - well, I don’t know what the fuck we did, but we’re both still here, we can undo it.”

“Everything’s so _loud_.”

“Well, yeah, how else do you think I navigate? Do you need me to close the window, at least cut out the street noise?”

Neriel shakes her head, almost violently. “No. Stay. Please.”

So she does, half-hugging Neriel from on top of the nest until Neriel calms down. Tarkus can’t really blame her for panicking, perfectly reasonable reaction to not being able to fucking see all of a sudden. She’s not sure if it’d be any different if someone knew it was coming, or if that’s the kind of loss humans can predict and prepare for. She’s pretty sure there was no preparing for this, either way.

Eventually, Neriel lets out a shaky, deliberate exhale. “So that _is_ how they did it.”

Tarkus almost asks, and then remembers the biggest oddity of the botched execution - Crowley didn’t sound quite like Crowley. But now that she thinks about it, that rubber-duck bit sure sounded a fuck of a lot like Aziraphale, and now she’s kicking herself for not actually paying attention to the auras in the room that day. Those two are more similar to each other than where they each came from, but they’re not _that_ similar.

(She wouldn’t have told anyone anyway. Not when she didn’t even want to witness her old mentor’s gruesome obliteration in the first place.)

“And we can’t rely on it,” she says instead.

“No, we can’t. I’m not sure they could for a second time, not without advance warning of incoming trouble. Besides, I can’t cover for both of you at once and I’m not sure I could convincingly cover for Eric at all.”

“At this point, nobody could cover for Eric but Eric. And I don’t think I could stop fucking swearing long enough to convince those wankers I was you.”

Neriel laughs. “We could’ve done it easily Before, but we’re still getting to know each other again. So. How do we undo it, and what do we do instead?”

“Fuck if I know, but I’m fixing up _your_ wings before we try.”

“How do you intend to do that?”

“Whatever we did, we didn’t get it perfect.” Tarkus shifts her left hand into Neriel’s wing, watching her face in the mirror as Neriel relaxes into the contact. “Fine by me, if it means I get a chance to return the favor. When’s the last time you let someone help with these, anyway?”

“...I think you were there for it,” Neriel says, but she doesn’t protest as Tarkus miracles a bag into existence to hold the loose feathers and gets to work. “There’s a preening department these days, but it’s so impersonal I could never bring myself to go. It also didn’t take people long to start getting weird about those of us who kept black wings.”

“Not to mention your little memorial back here. What color did you give me when we traded?”

“Yellow. Eric took a red one.”

Tarkus isn’t as gentle as Neriel was - for one thing, after so long it’s weird _not_ having to account for claws - but Neriel doesn’t seem to mind, arching into the contact and making all manner of approving noises. In fact, Tarkus hasn’t even made it all the way down the left wing when Neriel starts glowing again, which is fucking weird to see coming off her own head now.

“Tone down the light show, Neri, I need to be able to see what I’m doing.”

“Oh! Sorry, it gets a bit haywire when I’m this relaxed.” Neriel does dial the glow back a few notches, before adding, seemingly to herself, “What are you - _stop_ that. I don’t think I like having an external Effort much.”

“Well, I don’t like having an internal Effort much, so we can call it even and fix it when I’m done.”

Neriel laughs. “Fair enough, I suppose. Anyway, I’d hate to bring your mood down when you’ve clearly relaxed.”

“What do you mean?”

“Eric called me Neri all the time. You only ever did it when you were really happy.”

Tarkus freezes in the midst of starting on Neriel’s right wing. “I - you were panicking. That’s all it was.”

“Not just now, it wasn’t.”

“Oh, _shut up_.” She should have fucking known Neriel would call her on it, but mostly, being happy is such a foreign sensation that she’d almost overlooked it entirely. Sometime over the last six months, she stopped leaning so heavily on anger.

Neriel hums, like she’s thinking about doing so. “No, don’t believe I shall. It explains why you jumped to thinking you’ll need an escape clause as well, instead of just worrying about my safety.”

“Even without that, I’d need something sooner or later just for talking to you. Eric’s probably going to need it sooner. If we’re already in it together, we might as well work on the problem together.”

Eventually, Tarkus finishes her work and ties off the bag of loose feathers. Neriel shivers as she puts her wings away.

“I can see why you needed the break when I finished,” she says. “And… that’s probably our best bet for untangling ourselves. Are you ready to try?”

“Yeah. It’s too fucking quiet in here.”

“If we can recreate this, you’re welcome to borrow my eyes any time you’d like.”

Tarkus sighs. “We’ll see. I really don’t need them, most of the time, and if what I want to see is you with your own face, we’re gonna run into a problem. But… I appreciate it.”

Neriel nods, and reaches for Tarkus’ hand before slipping out of physicality; before joining her, Tarkus takes a good, long look at Neriel’s face in the mirror. If she gets to choose the last thing she sees this time, even if it’s not Neriel in her own face, she’s blessed well going to.

***

“This mirror is _hideous_ , Tarkus. I’m keeping it.”

Tarkus snorts, hauling herself up onto the nest for a proper flop. “What, because it’s ugly?”

“Because you made it.”

“Fucking sap.”

“Yes, yes, I love you too.” The mattress shifts as Neriel gets up. “We’re going to need the experts to help us with this problem, so I’m going to make a few phone calls. You’re welcome to stay as long as you’d like, but if you have pressing business, I understand.”

“Because more pressing shit than spending time with you comes up _so_ often.” Tarkus hasn’t been by as often as she’d like, but that’s partly to maintain her own plausible deniability with Hell and mostly to discourage Wank-Wings and company from trying for Neriel again. “Put it on speaker.”

Neriel does, leading to a dull few moments of listening to the ringing noise before Eric picks up. “Hey, Neri.”

“Hi. How soon can you wrap up your current assignments?”

“Why? Did something happen? Do you need me there now?”

“Yes, something happened, but no, we don’t need you here immediately. We’re both fine, it’s just…”

“Personal security,” Tarkus says. “The sooner we figure it out, the better.” Hopefully she won’t have to say any more than that.

Fortunately, Eric seems to get the idea. “Give me… probably a week? I’ve got one thing nearly finished and another four to work through, but the way things have been going lately I’ll really only need to show up.”

“All right.” Neriel sounds like she’s not sure if she wants to ask. “This is going to take all of us to untangle, so I’ll let you know where we’re meeting.”

Crowley, on the other hand, doesn’t sound surprised by the topic at all, especially when Neriel outright asks if it was him she saw leaving Heaven. “Yeah, that was me,” he says. “I was hoping you’d catch that, Lantern. We’ve been chewing on the problem for a while now. Probably do us all some good to put our heads together. Come over to the shop and--”

“No,” Tarkus says - as does Neriel, which makes her smile. “I’m not going back into your friend’s biting bookshop again if I have a choice in the matter,” she adds. “I’d like to be able to fucking _leave_ on my own.”

“Fair enough, but if all three of you are in on this then I’m not bloody well hosting. Eric’s not coming onto my turf if I can help it.”

“Of course we’re all in on this,” Neriel says, but she doesn’t ask why Crowley’s so against Eric being on his turf. “I’m willing to host if there are no other alternatives, but if it’s possible, I’d like to get out of the house for a while. Until this is sorted out, I’m not sure I should risk it alone.”

“You shouldn’t, Lantern. They’re looking for any opening they can get, be sure of that.” Crowley goes quiet for several moments. “We might be able to sort something out, but it’s gonna take some more work on our end. How soon’s your third member available?”

“They said they need a week to tie things up.”

“All right. I’ll let you know before then who’s hosting.”

The line goes dead without any sort of pleasantries, and Tarkus says, “The fuck is his problem with Eric, anyway?”

Neriel sighs. “Eric said that when they delivered the Hellfire, they asked if they could punch Aziraphale, partly because they couldn’t get away with punching their actual target of choice. They didn’t follow through, but Crowley is nothing if not hyper-protective of Aziraphale.”

“And nobody holds a grudge like a demon.” Given that, it’s a wonder he tolerates Eric’s presence at all; Tarkus would bet it’s entirely for Neriel’s sake. “How’d you know what they did?”

“He smiled at me on his way out, and I only knew one of them beforehand. I’d settled on not asking, since who knows who might be trying to figure that out, but if anywhere’s safe to do it, it’s inside my own wards.”

***

Tarkus has nothing better to do, so she stays at Neriel’s while they sort out this whole conversation thing. She’d really rather not leave at all; leaving will break the bubble of peace she’s managed to claw back for herself, and after so long deliberately not thinking about how much energy staying angry takes, she doesn’t want to start expending it again.

In trying to put off choosing a side, she chose it months ago. Really, she should have known that when she got her hands on a phone.

Eric agrees to meet them wherever they end up having this discussion; when Neriel ends that particular call, she lets out a sigh of relief.

“Crowley’s going to insist on driving me, if we don’t meet here,” she says. “He’d probably give you a lift as well, but if he doesn’t want Eric in his flat, he _definitely_ won’t let them in his car.”

“You think he’d raise that much stink about a vehicle?”

“I know he would. The Bentley’s wards are the serious ones.”

The Friday after their inadvertent metaphysical experience, Crowley does indeed pick them up, and Tarkus has to concede the point about the wards - she can feel them coming from a block off.

“Where are we going?” she says, once the faff of actually getting into the car (old enough to only have two doors, apparently) is out of the way.

“Neutral territory,” Crowley says. “We need an outside perspective - a human one - and there’s only so many of those we can ask, so Tadfield it is.”

“You’re taking us to the end of the fucking world?”

“It’s not as though it actually ended,” Aziraphale says, somewhere between prim and smug - and then Crowley rockets off down the road, and Tarkus has to focus on willing her corporation not to expel the breakfast she didn’t need to eat all over the car’s interior. After far too long, the ride screeches to an abrupt halt; she clambers out of the car at the first opportunity, leaning against the side to catch her unnecessary breath.

“Never. Fucking. _Again_.”

“I liked it,” Neriel says, though even she sounds a bit breathless. “It’s nearly as good as flying.”

“Maybe if you can see what’s happening! All I had to go on was the fucking lurching! I’ll take myself home before I get in there again.”

“I’m given to understand Crowley’s driving is something of an acquired taste,” a new voice cuts in, and Tarkus drops the argument in favor of trying to figure them out. They sound feminine, and adult rather than one of the ridiculous small sizes humans come in (if anyone of celestial stock was ever that small, Tarkus doesn’t know about it). For a human, they have a pretty loud aura, which means she almost doesn’t have to strain to make it out.

“Anathema Device,” the stranger says, apparently by way of introduction. “Come on around back. Your friend’s already here.”

“Not _my_ friend,” Crowley grumbles, before huffing like he’s just been elbowed in the side.

Neriel links arms with Tarkus and says, “How do you know each other?” as they start for their meeting place.

“Armageddon,” Anathema says. “One of my ancestors had quite a bit to say on the topic - specific prophecy, though she didn’t have much context for what she was seeing and it didn’t tend to make sense until after the fact. She knew I’d be there, but I’m really not sure I contributed that much, other than getting the right person to the right place.”

“Stop that, Book Girl.” Crowley sounds vaguely annoyed, but if Tarkus had to guess, she’d say it’s because one of his distance nicknames is becoming an affection nickname again. “You and those conspiracy magazines of yours gave Adam’s power its _shape_. Aliens and random tunneling humans were a lot easier to deal with than some of the alternatives. Just because your active contribution didn’t look as active as you thought it should doesn’t make it less important.”

“And there’s quite a bit to be said for getting the right person to the right place,” Aziraphale adds. “I rather doubt anyone else who was present had spared much thought for the… human aspect of the celestial war, shall we say. Had the two of you not been present, it’s very possible the Horsepersons’ mischief would have continued unabated.”

“Yeah, if anything, _we’re_ the ones who didn’t do much.”

“If you say so.” Anathema sounds extremely dubious, and Tarkus wonders if Crowley’s annoyed because they’ve already had this conversation a few times along with the nickname bit - but before she can ask, they reach their destination, made apparent by Eric’s aura radiating nervousness.

“There’s a chair behind you,” Neriel says, when they stop. “Eric’s to your left. I’m going to take the one on their other side.”

Tarkus nods, reaching for Eric’s hand as she sits down (they catch it and squeeze back). The chair is flimsy and uncomfortable, but for an impromptu gathering it’s not terrible, and it doesn’t sound like anyone else’s is any better. They’re still outside, and a tree overhead is casting shade over a few of the chairs - fortunately, the breeze is light enough that the shifting light won’t give Tarkus a headache.

“So,” Anathema says, “you were vague on the phone. What exactly is this about?”

Aziraphale clears his throat, from not quite across the rough circle of chairs from Tarkus (Crowley is probably directly opposite her, then). “Well, as things shaped up, dear Agnes had one last scrap of advice for Crowley and myself, regarding navigating the immediate fallout of last summer’s events. Not being fools, we took it.”

“And Tarkus and I accidentally recreated it last weekend,” Neriel adds.

“Wait, _that’s_ what happened? And…” Eric trails off, eventually muttering, “Well, that explains a lot.”

“I’m sorry, Eric, I would have been more specific, but I didn’t know how safe it was to discuss with you not at my place. I’ll fill you in later. In any case, it’s a useful thing to know is possible, but it’s not something we can rely on in the long term.”

Anathema sighs. “I understand why you’re talking around exact details, but can one of you please at least explain why this is a bad long-term solution?”

“Those two had a pretty good idea of when they’d be ambushed,” Tarkus says. “If anyone gets bold enough to try again after they scared the shit out of two celestial realms, they won’t have that luxury. And then there’s the three of us. What works well for a pair is a fucking disaster for an odd number.”

Eric coughs. “And I’m, uh, kind of permanently bilocated anyway, which would probably make it trickier. And we _didn’t_ scare the shit out of two celestial realms. Neri’s been hiding in her base since she got it - they’ve already tried to take her back once.”

“Which brings us here,” Crowley says. “How do we ward ourselves against fatal damage?”

***

After several moments of relative silence (give or take nature carrying on around them), Anathema says, “Do you two ever _not_ have Earth-shattering problems?”

“We have six millennia of practice handling small shit, Book Girl. Count yourself lucky.”

“I’m touched. Okay, believe it or not, I actually haven’t had to ward anything against an angel or a demon before, so you’re going to have to tell me how it works on places, and we can go from there.”

That falls to Aziraphale, Crowley and Neriel, as they’re the ones who _have_ warded places before. Most of it, Tarkus doesn’t care about one way or the other - it’s good to know who to ask, if she ever settles into a planetside base that isn’t Neriel’s, but if they can leave this conversation with a plan for their personal safety, she doesn’t think she’s going to need to know any of this.

There is one thing that jumps out at her, though, and when the explanation hits a lull, she says, “Feathers.”

“What about feathers, Tark?”

“They’re the core of Neriel’s ward scheme. I’d be real fucking surprised if Aziraphale and Crowley didn’t at least use each other’s, for a permanent exception clause if nothing else. They’re the hardest base to fool. Whatever we decide to do, feathers will make it work.”

“Huh. You’re probably right.” Eric sounds thoughtful. “So like… should we trade another set and hang onto those, or something?”

“Physical objects could be lost, stolen or removed,” Aziraphale says. “A simple trade may be a start, but it’s far from ideal.”

“Well, we can’t exactly stick ‘em in our own wings, can we? They’d fall out. They’d _stick_ out. And that’s the most secure way we have to carry them.”

“Not necessarily,” Anathema says. “Before your friend’s brainwave, I was going to suggest tattoos - put the ward pattern directly on yourselves.”

Crowley sighs. “Also not great. You _have_ to know we’re bigger than what you can see, Book Girl. Soon as one of us got discorporated, we’d be vulnerable, and probably never have a chance to redo it.”

“What if you used a feather to apply it?”

Relative silence descends on the group again. Eventually, hesitantly, Aziraphale breaks it. “What if we _did_?”

“That… yeah, that might work,” Crowley says. “Just might be strong enough to pierce the corporation and leave a mark on what’s underneath, especially if it’s one of ours since we’ve been here so long. Or possibly Lantern’s, considering.”

Neriel snorts. “If you can persuade one of my feather shafts to break skin, I will be _very_ impressed. Just because I outrank Aziraphale and I’m…” She trails off, and starts again, sounding absolutely delighted. “I’m the best healer on Earth. I hadn’t really thought about it like that since February. Anyway, I’m a healer to the core, so I don’t think it’d work even separated from me.”

“Okay, so we could poke each other with feathers,” Tarkus says. “Would that be enough?”

Aziraphale makes a thoughtful noise. “There’s no reason it couldn’t be, but with written ward structures, the medium one writes in can be just as crucial as what one is writing, and this is effectively a written structure. It’d be better not to take unnecessary chances.”

“What do we write in, then? How do we make this as foolproof as possible?”

“Feathers again,” Anathema says. “There are people who have their pets cremated, when they die, and then have the ashes turned into ink. I don’t see why you couldn’t do the same.”

“That’d take a bloody lot of feathers,” Eric says.

“It would, but I can’t see it taking much more than, say, a good preening session each, and Tarkus and I did that last weekend as well. We’ll just have to catch you up later.” Neriel sounds pleased by the prospect. “And if we pool the results, the ink would presumably be that much stronger.”

“Oh, definitely,” Crowley says. “Especially considering what we’re trying to do here. Think we’re on to something, but we can’t just commit to this without testing it. The real question’s how we’re going to do that.”

Tarkus might have missed the shift in Anathema’s aura if they weren’t sitting next to each other - a human, even a very magically strong one, is always going to be drowned out by five angels and demons - but it does shift, suddenly uncertain. “Well, humans usually use pig carcasses as a stand-in, so… I don’t know, bless a pig and set it on fire?”

“No pigs. Please, no pigs.” Eric’s struggling to contain their laughter, if their hand shaking in Tarkus’ and amused tone of voice are any indication, so she relaxes - right up until they add, “I’ll do it.”

True silence seems to drop in for a moment, and then everyone starts talking at once.

“My dear fellow--”

“Eric, you _can’t_ \--”

“Even I wouldn’t ask you to do that!”

“That’s the _stupidest fucking idea I’ve ever heard_ \--”

“ _Guys_ ,” Anathema snaps, effectively shutting up the protests. “I agree that it’s not an ideal plan, but maybe we should let them explain why they volunteered?”

Eric sighs. “Partly, I’m not sure testing it on something that’s not alive will actually tell us whether it worked. We can’t test it on a human, either - they’re only hurt by water if they inhale it, and they’re _always_ hurt by fire, so it’s already not a good baseline. Partly, I guess I’m used to being signed up as the guinea pig--”

“You’re not fucking disposable!”

“I know, Tark, I know. But also… I don’t think holy water on one of my corporations would completely kill me anyway, as long as the other one’s not in the splash zone.”

“The sundering barriers,” Neriel says, sounding stunned. “As much trouble as I was having with them toward the end, you might be right. I still don’t _like_ this plan, but you might be right.”

“If we come up with a better test in the meantime, we should do that instead,” Aziraphale says. “But if all else fails, I suppose we do have the option to fall back on, and we do seem to have the beginnings of a workable plan. However, I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m feeling a bit peckish. Perhaps we should put business aside for a while?”

***

That’s pretty much the end of the conversation for the day, but planning continues over the next several weeks. Eric drops by Neriel’s place for the full body-swapping story and a thorough preening before they head out again; unable to delay the inevitable any longer, Tarkus heads out when Eric does, picking up an assignment in Bristol so she can be close by as things progress.

It’s almost funny. She’d gotten used to how fucking miserable actually being in Hell is, while she didn’t have any alternative to being there. Now, she finds herself fidgeting while Dagon sorts through planetside assignment files, hoping she doesn’t look over-eager to get the fuck out of there - but she is. The sooner they figure out this ward business, the better she’ll feel.

Neriel’s the one to suggest designing the ward tattoos so that they aren’t obviously wards, the better to keep anyone official from understanding what’s been done. It’s not a bad idea - the fact that they’re getting a human thing is already going to stand out.

They might as well not know at a glance that it’s a human thing doubling as protection from obliteration.

On the other hand, that makes visual aesthetics a consideration, and Tarkus isn’t going to let anyone put something on her that she doesn’t understand. She takes up Neriel’s offer to borrow her eyes during a lull in the Bristol thing, paging through a handful of illustrated books Aziraphale lent Neriel for the occasion.

“What’re you going with, anyway?”

“A spider web,” Neriel says (fuck, Tarkus is never going to get used to hearing her own voice when she’s not actually in her head, it sounds all _wrong_ in ways that have nothing to do with Neriel’s inflection). “It has a similar shape to the ward structure we’ve settled on, and I think it’s fitting.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Earth music, by proxy. I don’t know if you remember, but it’s actually from one of the things I put on Aziraphale’s gramophone after we fixed Eric. _It riles them to believe that you perceive the web they weave._ What are we doing if not exactly that?”

Tarkus laughs. “Especially you, since you had Wank-Wings and company to fill your head with bullshit for so long. If I don’t come up with anything appropriately badass, do the same thing for me.”

“That’s risky, if anyone decides to compare notes, but I will.”

She does find something, after a couple hours of digging - some spiky, roundish purple flowers that should match the ward shape, if she followed Neriel’s explanation right. How the _entire fuck_ humans got immortality out of a spiky flower (or really, any meaning out of any flower at all) she doesn’t remotely understand, but that only makes it more fitting.

“I don’t know if we’ll have much control over the color,” Neriel says, after Tarkus describes it. “But that’s certainly fitting.”

“It’s not like I’m ever going to see it. The color can be whatever, but I like the shape of this thing.”

“Mark the page, then, and I’ll have a look later.”

 _She’s obliged to no one,_ the music system contributes, and Tarkus smiles. Too blessed right, random human.

They do have to involve a pair of pig carcasses before they’re ready, to Eric’s very amused chagrin. But this is too important to risk fucking up the patterns on each other, so anyone who’s planning to do one of these things needs a chance to practice - which leads to some discussion, at Anathema’s place again, over how many of them actually need to put the ink down on someone else. All Tarkus knows for sure about that is she won’t be poking holes in anyone, so she stays out of it.

“Are you having a party, Anathema?” a small human says, interrupting the discussion.

“Not… exactly.” Anathema sounds at a loss as to how to explain this - which, to be fair, it _is_ a pretty fucking weird gathering by human standards. “Adam, this is--”

“‘s fine. They all know who I used to be.”

Tarkus freezes. Now that the bleeding obvious has been pointed out, she can’t see how she missed it; this kid is bubbling with raw power, less than he should be but way, way more than she’d expect to find in someone who declared Satan to never have been his father.

“Nobody mentioned _he_ was coming,” Eric says, apparently on the verge of a completely fucking legit panic attack.

Crowley sighs. “He’s a human kid, he does what he wants. I didn’t know he’d be crashing either. Your friends with you?”

“Nah, it’s just me,” Adam says. “What’re you doing?”

Aziraphale ends up explaining the basics of what’s going on, with Neriel chiming in regarding the discussion they were just having. When they finish, Adam doesn’t say anything for several moments.

“I reckon you’ll get better results if whoever’s doing the work loves the person they’re helping,” he finally says. If that’s not the sappiest fucking advice Tarkus has ever heard, she doesn’t know what is, but she wouldn’t be surprised if he’s on to something. “You wouldn’t be doing this otherwise, would you?”

“Well, I also like not being obliterated,” Crowley says, “but more or less.”

“If I don’t get in my own way, maybe only two of us need to do the work. Obviously you’re going to have to handle Aziraphale’s, you’re the closest to him by far, but…” Neriel pauses for a moment, and Tarkus can blessed near hear her smile. “If you didn’t still care about me, you would have dropped ‘Lantern’ months ago.”

“Oh, rub it in, why don’t you.”

“The feeling’s mutual. Anyway, unless you’d rather keep yours between the two of you, I think that would solve the problem quite nicely.”

“And if you do get in your own way?” Eric says.

“Then we’ll figure something else out. This will save enough trouble in the long run that I really do think I’ll be fine, though. Thank you, Adam.”

“You’re welcome,” Adam says, in a tone that can only mean he has a shit-eating grin on his face. “It’s nice, not being the only one choosing to stay here. It’ll make it easier to stop them meddling again.”

***

Neriel doesn’t end up getting in her own way, but Crowley decides he’d rather have Aziraphale do the work on him. Tarkus can’t say she’s surprised, considering; either way, there’s something deeply ironic about the division of labor. Only appropriate, really, that the angels are warding the demons and a demon is warding the angels.

While those three get their practice in, with regular ink on the pig carcasses, Eric helps Anathema with making the ink they’re going to need for the final project. Tarkus really didn’t need to be here for this excursion, but she’d rather be on hand if trouble shows up - then again, with the ex-Antichrist poking his head in, she’d be surprised if trouble _could_ find them. Still, the warmth of the completely normal fire is pleasant to sit by while she listens to everything else going on in Anathema’s backyard.

What’s more concerning, at least from where she’s sitting, is that Eric’s semi-suicidal idea is still the best plan they’ve got for testing these things. She can’t think of anything better; neither can the others. She’s half sure Eric mostly suggested it because they wanted to contribute something, but _literally anything_ would be better than that, if they could just come up with a better plan.

“What color do you think it’ll be?” Eric says.

“I don’t know. I’d be surprised if we figure it out even after watering it down.” Anathema’s assured them they can do that part with completely normal water, but the irony of how close the components come to exactly what they’re trying to guard themselves and each other against was lost on exactly no one. “Ash usually results in a darker pigment, but then again, the ashes in question have… probably never been angel and demon feathers in a big pile before.”

“Only probably?”

“Highly unlikely,” Anathema says. “The nature of the world is such that I don’t want to rule anything out, even if I can’t see those two handing out feathers at random.”

“Oh, no, that’d be a fast way to get themselves into trouble. You give someone a feather, you’re promising to come back when they call. Can’t see anyone being happy if they just passed that kind of power to random humans, least of all them.”

Tarkus snorts. “Yeah, can you imagine? Some poor fucker tries to call in a favor and Aziraphale’s just pissy that they dragged him away from his dinner? And then whichever of ‘em wasn’t summoned would go on the fucking warpath.”

Whichever of them _was_ summoned would probably calm the fuck down when they saw the situation at hand, since Tarkus can very easily imagine either of them taking enough shine to A Particular Human to give them a last-ditch panic button. But that would change nothing about the immediate annoyance, or the property damage the other one would lay down to get them back.

By complete coincidence, they have everything ready to go around the time of Neriel’s one-year anniversary of absconding to Earth to get herself some answers. Neriel hosts them for it, on the grounds that her base is half ready for such an operation anyway, since she’s using it as a medical clinic for humans (not to mention her wards mean they can’t be interrupted). Eric obviously has to have the work done first, since they’re still slotted as the guinea pig.

(Tarkus still fucking hates it.)

“Are you ready?”

“As I’m going to be,” Eric says - and then _yelps_ no more than a minute later.

Neriel gasps. “Are you all right? That wasn’t too hard, was it?”

“No, no, I’m fine, that just. Went right through me. Not sure how else to explain it.”

“Well,” Aziraphale says, “I should think that’s a promising sign, if nothing else.”

“We can hope,” Neriel says, and a tense silence settles in as she gets back to work.

When Tarkus can’t take it anymore, not least because her mind is spiraling around how the test could go catastrophically wrong, she says, “So what color _is_ the ink, anyway?”

“...You know, I’m not sure it can make up its mind.” Eric sounds puzzled, but this also tells Tarkus their tattoo is going somewhere they can at least kind of see it, as opposed to Neriel planning for hers to go directly between her wings and Tarkus aiming for her lower back. “Maybe it’ll be easier to tell on someone else, since you lot all have lighter skin than me. Or maybe it just does this. Far as I can tell, there’s bits of all of us in it.”

Crowley snorts. “Fitting.”

The silence descends again, but doesn’t have long to settle in before Neriel declares her work done.

“Cool. Okay.” Eric draws a deep breath that can only be serving to calm their nerves somewhat, or at least try to. “Guess it’s time for me to go do something monumentally stupid and see a lady about some holy water.”

Anathema agreed to do this portion of the actual test, for several reasons - it saves anyone else from having to be the bad guy, Neriel doesn’t want a possibly-threatening patch of floor in her base when Tarkus can’t see it, and Anathema’s house is decidedly far enough away to keep everyone else safe while Eric’s being fucking stupid. As Eric teleports out to see to that, Tarkus drops out of physicality to watch from a safe distance.

She doesn’t want to, but she has to. If this only partially works, she’d rather know now than wait for Eric to get back. If it doesn’t work at all… well, Neriel’s there to pick up her pieces now, but mostly, Eric’s spent so long with no one caring about their well-being that Tarkus is determined not to let their possible obliteration go unwitnessed.

She stays well back from the twin golden domes that mark Eric’s remaining sundering damage, and watches. Nothing happens. After several minutes, nothing continues to happen. She thinks one of the domes might vibrate faintly, but she’s not close enough to tell. Still, it’s something to hold onto, and after a good while of nothing continuing to happen, she takes herself back to Earth.

She’s just in time for Eric to come back in. “It worked! Sorry it took so long, she insisted I actually towel off entirely first.”

“Well, of course she fucking did, the rest of us aren’t warded yet. What, were you just going to come back and drip menacingly at us?”

Eric laughs, and Neriel says, “Well then. Who’s next?”

Tarkus sighs. “Might as well get this shit overwith. Somebody help me get situated.” She can make it over to Neriel’s clinic bed easily enough, but clambering onto it and making sure her clothes are out of the way is a little more complicated.

“Got you covered, Tark.”

“This may take a little longer than Eric’s, since you picked a more complex design,” Neriel says. “Are you ready?”

Tarkus nods, as best she can when she’s face-down on the bed. “Go for it.”

When Neriel makes the first breach of her skin, Tarkus immediately understands what Eric meant. It’s not painful - quite the opposite, it’s nothing short of _euphoric_. Fortunately, Eric’s comments were enough cue that Neriel pauses for a bit after that first breach, and Tarkus takes advantage of getting her wits about her to dismiss her Effort for the time being. The last thing she needs is that deciding it’s a fine time to make a mess.

By the time Neriel’s finished, Tarkus feels better than she can remember feeling since… well, probably since Heaven.

***

“Discorporation’s still a bit of a thing,” Crowley says later on, after they’re all done. He sounds as blissed out as Tarkus still feels. She’s starting to wonder how long it’ll linger, but not about to question it.

Neriel hums in equally dazed agreement. “That’s true. I doubt they would have been willing to re-corporate a few of us even before this. We’ll have to be careful, and think on it later.”

“Yeah, way later,” Tarkus says. “At the core, we’re fucking _invincible_ , and for now that’s more than enough for me.”

“Quite right, dear girl.” Aziraphale sounds the least high of any of them - even Eric’s pretty giddy, now that they’re done playing guinea pig - but he _does_ sound deeply, viciously pleased. “With this hurdle seen to, we have the time to consider everything else. In any case, I think I’d rather like to head home, dearest. Thank you for hosting us, Neriel.”

“You’re welcome,” Neriel says, as Crowley stammers his way through enough incoherent noises that Tarkus almost wishes she could see his face.

“Ngk. I. Uh. Yeah. Sure, angel, whatever you want.”

Once they’re gone, Neriel leads the way upstairs without any further comment; all three of them flop onto her nest without crowding into each other, with Neriel in the middle. Tarkus is pretty sure Neriel has her wings out, based on how the air in the room is shifting.

“Eric? Do I have to do that to you a second time?”

Eric goes quiet, the way they do when they’re checking in on a corporation that’s not immediately nearby. “Nope. Went right through the split. Don’t worry, you only have to put the one avocado on my person.”

Tarkus wants to groan, but instead she ends up fucking _giggling_ \- and she can’t even bring herself to be upset about that. “Avocado? Fucking really?”

“I’m not letting him ruin it, Tark.”

“Well, you’re the one who has to live with it, so whatever.”

They pass hours like that, dropping in and out of physicality as the mood strikes them, no one up to saying much. Neriel’s music system is feeling pretty fucking triumphant as well, from the sound of things, but that’s only fair. By the time the morning sunlight cuts in through the windows, the outright giddiness has mostly faded, but Tarkus still feels a lot more centered than she’s used to. And maybe it won’t fade completely, considering she doesn’t have to be angry anymore.

Heaven won’t have her back, and the feeling’s mutual. But no one can take her friends away from her again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realised a bit into this story that the way I described Tarkus in part 1 is basically [Ruby from Great British Bake-Off](https://i0.wp.com/metro.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/gbbo1.png?w=1200&h=630&crop=1&quality=90&strip=all&zoom=1&ssl=1) (Netflix season 2, not 6).
> 
> Tarkus' tattoo design, meanwhile, is a [globe amaranth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gomphrena_globosa#/media/File:Starr_020304-9001_Gomphrena_globosa.jpg), and yes, [it does signify immortality](https://yesterdaysprint.tumblr.com/post/159136590454/the-language-of-flowers) if you ask Victorian England. (I am not sure offhand what the husbands went with. XD)

**Author's Note:**

> Music references continue apace in this one. Some of them dip back into [the first playlist](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3q-QChl5XwrHoX-cg6wJKSGWuVqaBmbP) and some of them [cover new ground](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3q-QChl5XwqdJ3DDGJqxIbySnxKCdSRi). (I fault no one who lacks the patience for all the everything that is the new playlist's first track, but you'll see why it's necessary at a glance.)


End file.
